Moulting advice for G. Rosea please.

[K Smith]

Hello there!

My Chile Rose hasnt moulted in about a year and a half. I bought her/him? this size (12cm legspan) in Feb 2010. She ate and ate up until around oct last year and has fasted since. She ate one crick about 2 months ago and i thought phew the fast has finished. Well i wasnt so lucky. She hasnt eaten since and i've been looking for the signs of an upcoming moult. She has never kicked hairs and over the last few months i've noticed a patch which is becoming more and more bald/scruffy. Im taking it that she is due a moult? The patch is not very dark yet.

I wouldnt be asking but i dont keep grammostola apart from this one and my sling g.pulchra (that one is the same, funny eating patterns and moult patterns).

Any advice on whether she is going to moult soon? I've added some pics i took this morning. She's (he's) a beauty! I can't wait for the moult as im dying to find out what sex she is too!

[K Smith]

Another pic...

Another pic...

[James Box]

hi there, i think the only thing you can do is wait!
but if it's any consolation, the abdomen does look like it's going black under the hairs...but that may just be the picture! sometimes it's hard to tell.
looks really healthy, anyway, so i'm sure it'll all go fine!
Grammies are a pain sometimes, but i still love them!

[K Smith]

Thanks

hi there, i think the only thing you can do is wait!
but if it's any consolation, the abdomen does look like it's going black under the hairs...but that may just be the picture! sometimes it's hard to tell.
looks really healthy, anyway, so i'm sure it'll all go fine!
Grammies are a pain sometimes, but i still love them!

Cheers James! It is actually going very gradually darker and darker but it has been over a period of months. Ill just wait some more...

As soon as i put this thread on my g.pulchra who hasnt moulted in over a year has flipped over onto its back!! I cant believe it! Hope the rosea takes the hint..

Thanks again!

[James Box]

good news!
it's a funny thing, but i've read so often about seemingly synchronised moults from different species throughout people's collections, that it's very well possible she will get the hint! at any rate, sounds like the day is approaching!
good luck to your pulchra!!!

[K Smith]

Well my Green bottle blue moulted yesterday and 3 days earlier my E.uatuman did too! So you could be right about that!

My pulchra has just finished. She got out ok and shes havin a well earned rest on her back. Her abdomen has got a nice black sheen again woohoo! I feel like a proud parent lol. Doesnt it feel great when they moult? Its like a birth everytime

[Mark Shingleton]

my rosea hasnt moulted in nearly 2 years now, and last time she had a meal was afew week after her last moult, she made a nice web carpet so maybe shes planning one. my rcf rosea not eaten since i got her about 6 mounth ago and not moulted in my care, my male rosea will eat any thing that moves tho.
i was wanderin weather spieces moult at the same time, last month all my brachypelmas moulted within a few days of each other, thats 2 smithis, vagans, boehmei and an albopidoodar.

[Stanley A. Schultz]

... My Chile Rose hasnt moulted in about a year and a half. ...

Read carefully http://people.ucalgary.ca/~schultz/roses.html.

[Stanley A. Schultz]

...
it's a funny thing, but i've read so often about seemingly synchronised moults from different species throughout people's collections, that it's very well possible she will get the hint! ...

Sorry, but this is a case of someone confusing causes and effects, and assuming some magical communication between tarantulas. Under some special circumstances tarantulas can communicate on some very basic level, but I'm really dubious about the assumption that this is one of those cases. Among other reasons being that this behavior is exhibited by dozens to hundreds of widely disparate species, and that the coordination spans an entire hemisphere on a large number of widely separated islands and continents.

Tarantulas in a given collection do not molt in synchrony because one of them blows a whistle or waves a red flag. They all molt at about the same time because they are all responding to the same set of cues: presumably, lengthening daylight and warming temperatures. A molt-a-rama occurs because of the changing of the seasons, not because "everybody else is doing it so I'll do it too."

By contrast, humans, being all the same species, and being gregarious creatures that have developed highly complex social interactions among themselves, do act that way. Monkeys to the core!

This brings to mind the question, "If and when we finally do encounter a true space alien, are we going to make the same sort of error in judgement or assumption?" Be afraid. Be very afraid! (Of our own inadequacies!)

[K Smith]

Wow thanks Stan. I've got your book 'tarantula keepers guide' and refer to it often. I've read the part about Chile Rose T's and have tried to implement what you have suggested for example 'keeping the rosea near an outside wall' and 'in a bedroom that receives diminished heat during the cooler months.' There is no 'artificial lighting' in the room just the indirect light from the sun which provides the heat during the day and the room cools by perhaps 7 degrees at night to 21degrees and 12-14 degrees in the cooler months to 14-16 degrees. Therefore there is the obvious distinction between day/night and the seasons. I understand ill never replicate the natural environment.
I only provide a medium sized water dish for water and don't spray the tank at all. I did believe it was how I was keeping it that it hadnt moulted for so long, and when I read your book it did become a lot clearer.

There is the scruffy balding patch appearing gradually now and turning slowly darker, so fingers crossed it wont be long!

Tarantulas in a given collection do not molt in synchrony because one of them blows a whistle or waves a red flag! (QUOTE)

I think that's what James meant, i don't think he meant that they'r telepathic or shout to each other. It's got to be seasonal clues like you said. It's usually around may/june every year my whole collection starts to moult. Longer days and temperatures rising, (not by much in the UK... We have random weather patterns here) It's amazing really and an amazing sight! Usually involves me sitting at a table with a magnifiying glass or a microscope eagerly trying to sex them, and just in awe at what they'v just achieved (shedding their insides and appendages!)

Thanks for your input Stan, appreciate it!

[Stanley A. Schultz]

Wow thanks Stan. I've got your book 'tarantula keepers guide' and refer to it often. ...

And, thanks for the plug!

... I understand ill never replicate the natural environment. ...

And neither should you want to. Remember, "Mother Nature" doesn't have to pay anything for that tarantula. If it dies, another one will almost magically take its place. You, on the other hand, had to pay serious beer/rent/food/clothing money to get your pet tarantula. If it dies, you've lost a bundle!

And, in nature 99.9% of them die before they have an opportunity to reproduce. You definitely don't want to set your tarantula's environment up to mimic nature! That's the basic premise behind both Breene's book, Quick and Easy Tarantula Care, and ours. I don't remember Baxter (Keeping and Breeding Tarantulas) very well so I won't comment on it here. (I guess I need to go back and re-read a bunch of other tarantula books!) Marshall's book, Tarantulas and Other Arachnids, seems to contradict us, but when you read it carefully, you begin to understand that he's very careful not to mimic a natural environment. He basically just gives the tarantula enough substrate for burrowing and keeps the cage a little damper. His cages aren't full blown natural and organic, "toy utopias" like a lot of enthusiasts set up.

And yes, these 'natural and organic, "toy utopias" ' do work. But at great risk to the tarantula. Refer to the "Mother Nature" paragraph above. Another serious downside is that if something goes wrong, the enthusiast has a really huge job cleaning the cage and setting it up again. In the system we propound, a spare cage can be kept to one side, completely set up but bone dry, and the tarantula switched to it in a matter of seconds if a problem is detected or even suspected. And, such an arrangement is almost mandatory for the swamp dwellers like T. blondi because of the probability of crises.

... There is the scruffy balding patch appearing gradually now and turning slowly darker, so fingers crossed it wont be long! ...

In the circumstance where a Chilean rose hasn't molted in a long time the exposed bald patch may seem to gradually grow darker over weeks or months. Do not misinterpret this as preparation for a molt. I'm not sure why the skin slowly darkens but it apparently has nothing to do with the newly developing bristles underneath as they suddenly develop their pigmentation.

Which is why the bald patch turns dark in anticipation of a molt. Suddenly, seemingly overnight, the bald patch turns from some shade of tan or brown to a good, solid black. Within a week or two after that the tarantula flips on its back and molts.

There are three outcomes for your rose:

1. It has not undergone the "Hemisphere conversion," and will molt again sometime during October through December as though it were still back in Chile.
2. It will fail to molt at all for at least another year. I think the longest such period on record is something like three years!
3. It will molt next spring, having finally picked up the subtle cues for synchronizing itself with the UK's seasons.

... It's amazing really and an amazing sight! Usually involves me sitting at a table with a magnifiying glass or a microscope eagerly trying to sex them, and just in awe at what they'v just achieved (shedding their insides and appendages!) ...

Been there! Done that! The spring "molt-a-rama" was always a time of great rejoicing.

Best of luck. Enjoy your desynchronized little, 8-legged buddy!